Culbuto armchair & ottomane by Marc Held for Knoll International

Fascinated with the concept of kinetics and its relation to furniture — famously a conduit for stillness — French designer Marc Held, who founded Paris design firm Archiform in 1960, devised his most famous chair, the Culbuto armchair, for Knoll between 1967 and 1972. For Held at the time, design was all about motion.

Guided by the notion that standing still is more tiresome than walking continually, Held imagined a piece of furniture that would facilitate constant motion when he designed the Culbuto chair. (The series also featured a low-back armchair and an accompanying ottoman.) The resulting seat, which features leather upholstery over a rounded, fiberglass base, is essentially the ultimate rocking chair. Dispensing with his initial idea of including a counterweight in the design, the finalized shape of the armchair allowed for 360-degree movement, enabling its sitter to move without interruption while remaining comfortably seated. The chair takes its name from the French word for somersault, which was, appropriately, used to name “Monsieur Culbuto,” a classic “roly-poly” toy — a doll with a rounded base that makes it bob from side to side.

The shape necessary to attain such movement on Held’s chair required molding fiberglass into a bulbous, hollow-ball shape, which, like the Ball chair, lends the piece a distinctly Spage Age appearance. Following the debut of the Culbuto chair, Held’s practice shifted to reflect a heavier focus on architecture rather than product design, and Knoll discontinued the chair after only a few years. As such, there are only a few examples of the Culbuto on the market, making it an enviable get for collectors of modern, innovative and unusual furnishings.

As a company that produced many of the most famous and iconic furniture designs of the 20th century, Knoll was a chief influence in the rise of modern design in the United States. Led by Florence Knoll, the firm would draw stellar talents such as Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Eero Saarinen into its compass. Their work would help change the face of the American home and office.

The company was formed in 1938 by the German immigrant Hans Knoll. He first worked with his fellow ex-pat, the Danish designer Jens Risom, who created furniture with flowing lines made of wood. While Risom served in World War II, in 1943 Knoll met his future wife, Florence Schust. She had studied and worked with eminent emigré leaders of the Bauhaus, including Mies, Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer. She won Knoll over with Bauhaus notions of industrial arts, and an aesthetic that featured flat and tubular metal frames and angular forms. When Hans died in a car crash in 1955, Florence Knoll was appointed head of the company. It was as much through her holistic approach to design — a core division of the firm was dedicated to planning office systems — as Knoll's mid-century modern furnishings themselves that she brought about the sleek and efficient transformation of the American workplace.

Today, classic Knoll furnishings remain staples of modern design collections and decor. A history of modern design is written in pieces such as the elegant Barcelona chair — created by Mies and Lilly Reich — Saarinen’s pedestal Tulip chair, Breuer’s tubular steel Wassily lounge chair and the grid-patterned Diamond chair by Harry Bertoia.

As you can see from the collection of these designs and other vintage Knoll dining chairs, sofas and tables on 1stDibs, this manufacturer's offerings have become timeless emblems of the progressive spirit and sleek sophistication of the best of modernism.